(Thursday, May 22, 2003 -- CropChoice news) -- Dana Milbank, Washington Post: NEW LONDON, Conn., May 21 -- President Bush today accused Europeans
of perpetuating starvation in Africa by subsidizing agricultural
exports and by objecting to the use of bioengineered crops, raising
another grievance with Europe at a time of already tense
transatlantic relations.

The president, who embarks on a trip to the continent next week,
leveled his accusations against European governments in a speech to
graduates of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy here that was intended to
showcase humanitarian efforts by his administration. For the first
time raising the highly sensitive issue of Europeans' deep opposition
to genetically altered foods, Bush said well-intentioned American
efforts to reduce hunger in Africa have been thwarted by European
policies.

"By widening the use of new high-yield bio-crops and unleashing the
power of markets, we can dramatically increase agricultural
productivity and feed more people across the continent," Bush said in
a commencement address on the drizzly west bank of the Thames River.
"Yet, our partners in Europe are impeding this effort. They have
blocked all new bio-crops because of unfounded, unscientific fears."

Bush said Europeans, by closing their markets to bioengineered foods,
have caused African nations to avoid investments in such crops.
"European governments should join -- not hinder -- the great cause of
ending hunger in Africa," he said. Accusing those who subsidize
agricultural exports of preventing poor countries from developing
their own crops, he added: "I propose that all developed nations,
including our partners in Europe, immediately eliminate subsidies on
agricultural exports to developing countries so that they can produce
more food to export and more food to feed their own people."

By making the challenges to Europeans before the meetings of the
Group of Eight leaders in Evian, France, Bush significantly escalated
a food fight with European governments, which have been resisting
genetically altered crops in the face of broad public opposition.
Earlier this month, the United States and several other countries
filed a lawsuit with the World Trade Organization complaining about a
5-year-old European moratorium on bioengineered crops.

The administration said it acted because Europeans had not met
promises to repeal the ban. The European Union, which said it was
moving toward new rules, called the suit "legally unwarranted,
economically unfounded and politically unhelpful." In an op-ed
article in the Wall Street Journal today, U.S. Trade Representative
Robert B. Zoellick expanded on the accusation, writing of the
"dangerous effect" of the EU policy, in which "some famine-stricken
African countries refused U.S. food aid because of fabricated fears --
stoked by irresponsible rhetoric -- about food safety."

Bush's complaint about European agriculture subsidies elevated a
contentious element of the current round of negotiations at the World
Trade Organization. Europeans complain that while the United States
has few export subsidies, U.S. subsidies take the form of domestic
farm aid and donated international food aid.

Bush's accusation that Europeans are hobbling anti-hunger efforts was
part of a 26-minute speech in front of nearly 200 graduating cadets
that blended a defiant note against terrorism with a recitation of
the "compassion" in U.S. foreign policy. Bush invoked a humanitarian
rationale for foreign policy, listing his administration's policy
initiatives on AIDS, hunger and foreign aid in a manner typical of
President Bill Clinton and reciting the words of another Democratic
president who championed a moral foreign policy.

"President Woodrow Wilson said, 'America has a spiritual energy in
her which no other nation can contribute to the liberation of
mankind,' " Bush told the graduates, with the Coast Guard tall ship
Barque Eagle, a Nazi naval vessel taken as a war reparation, serving
as his backdrop. "In this new century, we must apply that energy to
the good of people everywhere."

Drawing a line from World War II to the present, Bush traced a moral
foreign policy. "We are the nation that liberated continents and
concentration camps," he said. "We are the nation of the Marshall
Plan, the Berlin Airlift and the Peace Corps. We are the nation that
ended the oppression of Afghan women, and we are the nation that
closed the torture chambers of Iraq."

The White House announced a new initiative, Volunteers for
Prosperity, in which doctors, engineers and other professionals could
take assignments of weeks or months to do humanitarian projects in
countries of their choice. Aides said the initiative, to be funded
largely with private money, would address excess demand for positions
in the Peace Corps, which allows volunteers to take only long-term
projects.

Bush's appearance in New London -- he speaks at one service academy
graduation annually -- came during the Coast Guard's first year under
the newly formed Department of Homeland Security, and the department
secretary, Tom Ridge, introduced Bush. After a 21-gun salute that
activated car alarms, Bush declared "good progress" in battling
terrorism. "Nearly one-half of al Qaeda's senior operatives have been
captured or killed," he said.

Democrats used Bush's address to the Coast Guard to call for more
funding for border security. Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.), a
presidential candidate, said that Bush's 2004 budget has no new funds
for "basic port security" and that the Coast Guard needs more money
to modernize. "The administration has failed to make the necessary
hard choices, and that leaves our waterways vulnerable to future
terrorist violence," he said in a statement.

Bush hailed the military victories in Afghanistan and Iraq but
acknowledged the limits of the progress against terrorism. Speaking a
day after his administration increased the terrorism alert level to
"high risk," Bush spoke of recent attacks in Saudi Arabia and
Morocco. "Our country has been attacked by treachery in our own
cities -- and that treachery continues in places like Riyadh and
Casablanca," he said. "We have seen the ruthless intentions of our
enemies."

Bush is beginning an intense period of diplomacy, beginning Friday
with a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi at the
presidential ranch in Texas. In addition to traveling to France for
the G-8 meetings soon, Bush will go to Russia and Poland, and the
White House is considering adding a stop in the Middle East,
including a visit with U.S. troops in Kuwait or a meeting with
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Prime Minister
Mahmoud Abbas.

Administration officials said they were still in the planning stages
and had made no final decisions on where Bush might go or whom he
might meet. Bush is anxious to demonstrate his commitment to moving
the Middle East peace process forward.